


The Living Joke

by Zarius



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Barbara Gordon is Batgirl, Batman: The Killing Joke, Batman: The Killing Joke References, Batman: Three Jokers - Freeform, Drama, F/M, Family Drama, Family Feels, Family Fluff, Jason Todd Has Issues, Joker (DCU) Angst, Joker (DCU) Backstory, Joker (DCU) Has Issues, Letters, M/M, POV Joker (DCU), Post-Killing Joke, Spoilers, fixfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-29
Updated: 2020-10-29
Packaged: 2021-03-08 23:33:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 869
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27265051
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zarius/pseuds/Zarius
Summary: Another "Three Jokers" Fixfic. Spoilers for the third issue. Joker writes Bats a letter telling him of what first got him to get dirtier.
Relationships: Joker (DCU)/Bruce Wayne, Joker/Jeannie (The Killing Joke)
Comments: 3
Kudos: 12





	The Living Joke

Dearest Diary

No, Diary was the name of a groupie I met in school.

Not my school, mind. Hers.

Bit too old to be in school too.

Who calls their kid, or friend, 'Diary?'

Well, me for starters. And only me.

Her name isn't even Diary. Real name's Joplin.

I christened her 'Diary' because she told me all about the days and weeks she'd led leading to our most spirited of meetings.

That day she left with a smile.

Ever wonder why I let them all leave like that?

Jeannie left with a smile.

Everybody ought to leave with a smile.

So, no Diary anymore, she's left, so who can I address this to.

Oh, but of course, you're reading this now, you're probably wondering where I left her.

Dearest Bruce

Dearest Batsy.

Your expertise is in tracking down my sources of amusement, I hear you checked in on the rest of the fam in Alaska.

Daddy isn't home just yet.

Daddy has to work.

His boss won't pay him back yet.

Will you Bruce?

Your little Bats, Babs and Jason, have paid me back, in blood, and through spite.

All you can pay me back in is kindness.

After all, I healed your greatest wound, you owe me that.

You left the wife and kid alone. You left them to live their lives snugly.

Its ok, we won't tell the authorities the almighty Batman was snooping around.

Oh she knows you were there Bruce.

I receive a lot of fan mail.

From my greatest fan.

I always send her a joke.

They're not knock knocks, they're not sketches, and they're not wind ups.

They're slice of life.

They're about quacks, and pigs, and freaks

They're all about people.

People that work with me, people that surround me, every day.

We think they're such putzes.

This city's population, they don't understand much about comedy, just the simple stuff.

I don't work simple.

I don't talk their kind of language.

But Jeannie could always decipher me.

She always laughed.

Jeanie always knew me best Bats.

We often dreamed big about my career.

I never thought I'd break out

She, on the other hand, always dreamt of breaking out. Out of the city.

With the way I was treated on the club scene, she wanted every simple snob who heckled me off the stage to pay for our big break, pay us back in wads of cash, they didn't even need to laugh, they could offer it begrudgingly, in acknowledgement that we had made it when they said we couldn't.

I'd been offered a big gig. A night out at a Chemical plant.

You know the one.

If all went right, I'd get paid my due. And we'd make it big.

We'd break out.

Jeannie, however, wanted a thrill of her own. She didn't want to feel left out, she wanted to get ahead of me in case I was caught, in case I couldn't make it back to her.

So we thought about it, not too hard, not too far.

We thought simple.

We thought about the people outside our house, the pigs in their blankets, wrapped tight, a siren above their heads, on a stake out, in the cold, in the dark.

We'd make their days and months a little more exciting.

Jeannie would tell them stories, of a tall man, a loser, failed, twisted, taking it all out on her and our unborn child.

A woman living in fear of what he'd do next.

They'd believe it. They'd pull their resources; they'd arrange safe passage for her out of the city, set her and the kid up in a nice place in Alaska

And they got to spin their own yarn too, they told me she and the baby both died following an electrical short from a baby bottle heater.

They probably thought they could out-clown a comedian.

Through it all, Jeannine said to have smiled.

Even at that.

It was easy and simple.

But it was oh so dirty.

I'd never told a dirty joke before then.

It taught me to be so much dirtier later on.

A new life ahead of her, ahead of us, all I'd need do is collect my cut, do the job, find her, we'd live off the joint prank we pulled on the pigs, on the city, on the simple.

But I never found my way home. Not after that night.

I found myself always heading towards your shadow.

And I've spent so much of my life living comfortably in it.

This city is so hard to take, but you, the pigs in their siren blankets, the quacks in the Asylum, you all make it so easy.

Easy for me to tell stories of.

The kid loves to read of them.

They make Jeanie laugh.

We should be a comic book you and I, don't you think?

Jeannie understands, you see, she and Junior? They're the joke now Bruce

Their lives together are the punch line.

My first real living punch line.

The living joke.

Living the dream.

Her dream

My dream.

I dream of Jeannie.

Get it?

I watch way too much TV.

Same Bat-Time, Same Bat-Channel

-Your Greatest Pain


End file.
